Working Class Runner

Yesterday, with no scheduled training, I decided on a whim to a) run on a morning work break instead of walk, and b) run a 5 minute all-you-can VO2max time trial before jogging back.

Every now and then I do stuff like this, and just like last time I did it to fill out my Stryd data, as my max power stats at 1-10 minutes were beginning to stale-date.

I went out hard eyeing my power data on my Garmin. If I couldn’t hold 320 W (around the range of prior max data) at any point, I would just slow down, forget about it, and jog the rest out as usual.

But I felt spry and found I could hold 320-340 W with sustainable difficulty. I kept going and was not only able to finish all 5 planned minutes before slowing down, but I might have set a kilometer PB in the process (I’d have to go back to my 2017-2018 logs though to verify that), and the overall pace was very close to my 5K PR.

Stryd, as it does, did register the relevant segments as new max power segments, but my Critical Power ended up going down. This is normal when you set new short-range high-power benchmarks, as (long story short) the algorithm tends to subsequently adjust down your estimated capacity at longer distances, programmed to presume you’re evolving into more of a short/medium distance runner than a long distance runner. If I run improved hour+ long runs in kind later, the CP will go back up.

While you don’t want to end up a slave to your app data, it can provide a useful guideline for where you need to occasionally challenge or push yourself.

One recent point of focus is an old theatre movement principle: To do your best to feel or seem relaxed when you’re doing something difficult.

This is actually an additional adjustment I made on recent treadmill training. Whenever the run starts to feel difficult, I make a point to run as relaxed as possible, which bolsters my effort going forward. Overall, I imagine this will prove very helpful on marathon day. But in the short term, it’s helped me avoid discouragement or any relevant mental need to slow or stop the workout.

This was an important general lesson from my theatre days, and I think it helped make me tougher across the board throughout my entire life in Seattle and later Chicago. I also think to some subconscious degree it helped me a lot with my everyday running, when I’d run miles home from work in all avrieties of weather. It certainly helped on my long runs.

I imagine it’s a big reason I’ve accomplished as much as I have in taking up running later in life and getting as far as I did despite no formal training or racing prior to that.

Whether or not I got away from that in recent years, consciously applying that mindset to my treadmill workouts has certainly helped. It’s just a next step on top of lots of steps I’ve taken over the years.

On Tuesday night after work I knocked out 5 uninterrupted miles at aerobic pace on the treadmill, after struggling for a while to run without overheating on the turbo. I previously had to take multiple breaks, both walking and outright breaks, to get through prior workouts.

Silly as it sounds, and despite all other fitness I had to this point, this was a breakthrough workout. Sure enough, the 3 treadmill miles last night felt substantially easy in comaprison and I finished that in 30 minutes with no trouble.

I did make some recent adjustments that in hindsight did help me get over the hump.

• Ironically, increasing the treadmill pace a bit made the runs easier. Even though I was previously used to my old pace, it now had me going slow enough that my body was doing extra work to maintain it. I could get more into a natural running motion once I picked it up.
• In previous sessions, in part because of the above, I did play around with the pace more, and I think this hurt more than it helped. I finally found a sweet spot with my new pace range and have held to that pace range on recent treadmill sessions.
• As mentioned before, my new gym at Mountain’s Edge is much better air conditioned, so the indoor air is a bit cooler. This absolutely helps.
• I’m eating a more complete breakfast as of recent mornings, including fruit and some tart cherry juice (which previously I had only taken at night). I think this has helped keep my energy levels stable throughout the day prior to the evening workouts.
• I cut down on work break runs, allowing myself to walk instead with incidental running sections as desired. This probably has conserved my energy for the evening sessions, which granted are still done while fairly tired.
• I recently went back through an old James Dunne running form course, and his week one advice on correcting anterior pelvic tilt has been helpful for maintaining a solid range of motion in better running posture.
• This may be a placebo effect, but I’ve run with my glasses off during recent treadmill runs. This makes it difficult to see the TV’s or anything else at the gym, avoiding distractions and better maintaining my focus on the run.

After taking today off from training, I plan to run 5 miles once again Friday and am on the fence about attempting Saturday’s 11 mile long run on the turbo or once again going out of town. If I can’t wake up before 6am Saturday (which is why I didn’t do a Saturday long run), that will likely make the decision easy.

While I enjoyed Flagstaff last weekend, I was a bit bummed about not getting to trek to Big Bear, and I do want to make that day trip and take a run there at some point soon. I don’t want my first run at its high altitude to be something relatively tough like a 16 miler, and 11 is right in the sweet spot. This isn’t the only weekend where I’d have that opportunity, though.

Plus, Vegas has cooled off somewhat after its 2nd big (110+°F) heat wave, and will continue to cool through next week. A morning long run in 80-90°F could be possible next weekend (but not this Saturday, with the high still forecast for about 105°F and lows still in the high 80’s).

We’ll see, though. Right now, I’m just glad with the progress I’m appearing to make on my overall run quality.

So I pivoted my run training a bit and here’s how:

I had little trouble getting my work break runs done while still training in the evenings, but at times these little runs were rather tough in the Vegas heat.

Today is a rest morning from work break runs. I went for a walk instead and impulsively decided (in part admittedly because I didn’t want to exceed my 15 minute break) to run a bit towards the end. This was easy to do, I was able to run fast for a little bit, and didn’t take nearly as much out of me or make me nearly as hot. It certainly helped that I walked casually for several minutes to get things flowing at a relaxed level before attempting to run.

I liked how that turned out and now I think I’ll just do this for all future work breaks… just walk for a bit and then run for a couple minutes towards the middle/end. If I’m training regularly outside of work, I don’t really need the run mileage from work breaks (average of about 10-15mi per week), though my energy is still better if I run a bit than if I just walk. It’s a great middle ground, especially with this Vegas heat.

I also switched Planet Fitness gyms. My home location was the Silverado gym nearest to my home. But I started going to the new Mountain’s Edge gym on Blue Diamond in the southwest corner of town after work, and it’s been consistently better.

• The air conditioning at Mountain’s Edge is far better than Silverado’s warmer, more muggy conditions.
• The treadmills at Mountain’s Edge are new and feel more comfortable to run on than the older models at Silverado.
• It’s somewhat along the way home from work rather than requiring I go out of my way to get to Silverado. (Arroyo Crossing’s location is more direct, but lacks a lot of the other positive qualities I’m mentioning)
• The parking lot at Mountain’s Edge isn’t the pain to navigate that it is at Silverado, nor is it crowded with riff raff from the other surrounding (and ethically questionable) businesses.
• While this may be because it’s new and could change, the crowd at Mountain’s Edge is a lot more relaxed to be around. It’s gotten somewhat annoying at Silverado.
• And even given I’d have to travel farther from home to get to Mountain’s Edge, it’s a relatively smooth commute compared to the shorter but more laborious route I had to take to Silverado.

I went a few times to Mountain’s Edge and now realize I only go to my old gym a couple times a week at most. I can still go to outside locations because I’m a black-card member (up to 10 times a month), so I can still go to my old location a couple times a week without penalty.

The only true loss is that Mountain’s Edge lacks ARC Trainers. But as of now I’m focused less on cross training, and as mentioned I can visit Silverado (plus, though it’s far away, the Lake Mead Henderson location has them) if I really want or need to use an ARC Trainer. I’ve also warmed up in recent months to the elliptical, which Mountain’s Edge has in spades, so it’s not a huge deal if I need to cross train full time for some reason.

Now that I’m planning to train a LOT on the treadmill, the comfort of running in a well air conditioned environment like Mountain’s Edge becomes more important. I can humidity-acclimate in the other, warmer locations when it’s closer to Indy race day. I want to escape as much heat as I can right now.

I took a weekend trip to Flagstaff.

The original plan was to wake up early Saturday, take a day trip to Big Bear Lake in California, and run long there.

But I couldn’t get to sleep Friday until late, and I woke up too late to get to Big Bear before 10am, which may have been too late for a long run, and definitely would have been too late to avoid traffic and parking problems in a popular destination.

With Las Vegas temperatures up to 115-120°F this weekend, I decided this was the weekend to experiment with a short road trip for a medium-long run in a high-altitude location, which I had been considering for some time. Locations I considered included Big Bear, Navajo Lake in Utah, and Flagstaff in Arizona (nearby Mount Charleston is a bit too tough to run in for now).

Big Bear was spatially the closest of the bunch, allowing for a day trip. Lodging isn’t cheap (lodging on this much notice is typically $150+ a night), so I wasn’t looking to stay the night for now. But to get in a proper long run I knew I needed to get there very early. Having woke up late Saturday, I could not. I also didn’t want to postpone the trip outright, because part of the reason for going was to get out of the extreme Vegas heat.

I had considered going anyway and taking my chances, but I looked up lodging and found Flagstaff had hotels available that night for $118. I quickly booked one, decided to make the trip and to run long Sunday. I hurriedly packed gear for the night, topped off the gas tank, had breakfast and coffee and took the drive.

A drive that should have taken less than 4 hours became a somewhat harrowing 6.5 hour experience, stuck in a massive traffic jam on I-40 west of Seligman due to a wrecked semi-truck, a horrid detour attempt that landed me on an isolated rocky dirt road (thanks Google Maps) and a subsequent 2 mile adventure to try and get back onto the gridlocked highway, then a long detour towards the Grand Canyon at Williams and back down US 180 to avoid another horrid I-40 backup east of Williams, before finally arriving in Flagstaff around 5:30pm.

Though I hoped to get in a shorter run and a gym session when I got into town, I was pretty gassed from the whole experience. I did manage to go visit Historic Downtown for a bit, but barely had it in me otherwise to get dinner down the street before turning in.

This morning, I took water with me and ran an extended route I hurriedly planned the day before, going up towards Buffalo Park and back down towards Downtown before turning up Route 66 back to where I was staying. It was exactly the 8 miles I was looking for, and despite the altitude it honestly didn’t feel too bad. I was constantly on the lookout for extra distress but nothing came of it. I didn’t stop for breaks or anything either. While I paced myself well and it was cool outside, I was expecting it to be harder.

After taking it easy over coffee I’ll gas up and head back west into the Vegas oven. If the thin air was indeed a limiter then the upcoming treadmill runs this week should feel a lot easier, even if they feel a lot hotter.

The Big Bear trip can wait for a future week. I think I can handle a long run on the turbo this next weekend, but if another scorcher weekend approaches I can take a shot at a Big Bear long run then.